the
Exploration of the Great West about 1842-3. You will find mention of
Kit Carson in my memoirs, vol. I, p. 46, 47, as bringing to us the first
overland mail to California in his saddle bags. I saw but little of him
afterwards till after the Civil War, when, in 1866, I was the Lieutenant
General commanding the Military Division of the Missouri, with
headquarters in St. Louis, and made a tour of my command, including what
are now Wyoming, Colorado and New Mexico. Reaching Fort Garland, New
Mexico, in September of October, 1866, I found it garrisoned by some
companies of New Mexico Volunteers, of which Carson was Colonel or
commanding officer. I stayed with him some days, during which we had a
sort of council with the Ute Indians, of which the chief Ouray was the
principal feature, and over whom Carson exercised a powerful influence.

"Carson then had his family with him--wife and half a dozen children,
boys and girls as wild and untrained as a brood of Mexican mustangs. One
day these children ran through the room in which we were seated, half
clad and boisterous, and I inquired, 'Kit, what are you doing about your
children?'

"He replied: 'That is a source of great anxiety; I myself had no
education,' (he could not even write, his wife always signing his name
to his official reports). 'I value education as much as any man, but I
have never had the advantage of schools, and now that I am getting old
and infirm, I fear I have not done right by my children.'

"I explained to him that the Catholic College, at South Bend, Indiana,
had, for some reason, given me a scholarship for twenty years, and that
I would divide with him--that is let him send two of his boys for five
years each. He seemed very grateful and said he would think of it.

"My recollection is that his regiment was mustered out of service that
winter, 1866-7, and that the following summer, 1867, he (Carson) went to
Washington on some business for the Utes, and on his return toward New
Mexico, he stopped at Fort Lyon, on the upper Arkansas, where he died.
His wife died soon after at Taos, New Mexico, and the children fell to
the care of a brother in law, Mr. Boggs, who had a large ranche on the
Purgation near Fort Lyon. It was reported of Carson, when notified that
death was impending, that he said, 'Send William, (his eldest son) to
General Sherman who has promised to educate him.' Accordingly, some time
about the spring of 1868, there came to my house, in